


Where Did You Come From, Where Did You Go?

by storieswelove



Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: Alternate Universe - Country Western Bar, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Meet-Cute, honestly blame MWT and her damn square dances, i said what i said, this was fun while it lasted but I'm going to have to remove myself from fandom after this, yeah you heard me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:55:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24824932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storieswelove/pseuds/storieswelove
Summary: Irene's friends drag her out to a country western bar. She's less than thrilled to be there. Helen's obnoxious cousin, on the other hand, isthrilled.
Relationships: Attolia | Irene/Eugenides
Comments: 25
Kudos: 73





	Where Did You Come From, Where Did You Go?

**Author's Note:**

> Queen's Thief Appreciation Week, Day 6: Alternate Universe 
> 
> This came to me at 2:30am last Monday, in a horrifying panic that I had no choice but to write it. The square dances and line dances references in KoA have haunted me for YEARS because of the hilarious country music parallel, and I just couldn't help myself. The muses demand what they demand.

Irene can’t believe her friends tricked her into a night out at this godforsaken country western bar _again._ She’s leaning against a wall in the darkest, emptiest corner of the bar and she’s— well, she’s painfully aware of what a TV stereotype she looks like, brooding in a corner, sipping her double whiskey and glowering at the crowded dance floor. She’s not going to pretend otherwise. 

She’s still annoyed when her sulking is interrupted. 

“Those are really cool earrings.”

She jumps at the sudden voice in her ear, close and loud enough to be heard over the music. Irene turns to look at the guy, who looks pleased to have gotten a reaction. How the hell hadn’t she seen him walk up? 

Irene knows him, but can’t seem to place him. He’s got warm, brown skin; dark, curly hair, and... Oh. He only has one hand.

Helen’s cousin. 

Irene can’t remember his name— something old-school, maybe a family name? Or religious?— even though they’ve met a few times, at bars and parties. He’s much younger, and from what she can remember, immature and desperate for attention.

Clearly that hasn’t changed. He’s managed to take the western theme entirely too seriously. He’s in a Nudie suit — dear gods, did he own this already? — embroidered with erupting volcanoes, some men sword-fighting, and what looks, inexplicably, like elephants. His brown leather cowboy boots have matching gold accents, and his double ear piercing includes a thin gold hoop and what looks like a carved sapphire stud. The entire outfit is ridiculously over the top. 

Much to Irene’s irritation, it actually works. 

“What?” she says. She’s distracted. 

“Your earrings — they’re really cool,” he repeats.

Her hand flies up to the golden bees dangling from her ears. They’re her favorite earrings, inherited from her mother. She wouldn’t have worn them tonight if she had known she’d be coming _here_. “Thank you.”

He smiles at her, warm and friendly, if a little awkward. “Gen, by the way,” he says loudly, talking over the noise. “I know we’ve met but, well.” He gestures at the loud, drunken space around them as if that explains why he expected her to have forgotten him. 

It probably does. 

“Irene.” 

“I remember,” he says with another warm smile. It tugs at something in her chest. 

“But really, what’re you doing wearing those earrings here? Those are the nicest things this bar has ever seen,” he says. 

She gives his Nudie suit a once over. 

“Well,” Eugenides says, with a thoughtful head tilt. “Maybe _tied_ for the nicest thing.”

“Mmm,” she says, and half-turns back to look at the dance floor, worrying one of her earrings between her thumb and forefinger. “I thought we were going to dinner.”

From the corner of her eye, Irene can see he brightens, though she can’t imagine why. 

“Well, you’d have to ask me out first, but I’d say your chances are pretty good.”

Her single raised eyebrow belies the hitch in her breath she manages to hide. That was obnoxiously smooth. 

“I’m going to dance,” he says, left hand — only hand — palm up, tilted slightly toward her in offering. “Join me?”

She looks at him. “No.” 

He shrugs. “Suit yourself. It was nice talking to you, Irene,” he says, and waltzes off to the dance floor. Within seconds, he’s found someone else to dance with. 

*

Irene is leaning against the bar, a fresh drink in her hand, when the music shifts to something upbeat and familiar. Oh — apparently they’ve moved on to the line dancing part of the night. 

She’s watching the drunken crowd dance to “Cotton-Eye Joe” when she spots Gen. He’s front and center, dancing in a group, and somehow, inexplicably…he’s _good_. 

A line dance to “Cotton-Eyed Joe” isn’t supposed to be something _anyone_ is good at — it’s a dance they teach five-year-olds in PE. It doesn’t involve any actual skill. 

Except apparently it does. Gen is moving with a practiced grace that shouldn’t be allowed at a _country western bar_ . He’s dancing in time with Helen and five or six other people who look as though they could be relatives . Irene wonders if they’re one of _those_ families — it happens sometimes, a group shows up who is so good it blows everyone else in the room out of the water. 

Irene can’t stop watching them. 

Eugenides looks over at the bar and catches her eye. She still can’t bring herself to look away. He gives her a giant, toothy grin and, without ever looking at his dance partners, slips his right arm over one man’s shoulder, his left arm around a woman’s waist, and together they lift two women off the ground for a spin. 

*

“Red wine, please. And a cup of water?” 

Gen has appeared at her side again, fresh off the dance floor, face sweaty and hair a little wild. 

The bartender looks back at him funny. Gen tilts his head, feigning ignorance. Irene snorts. Gen doesn’t turn, but she sees a tiny upward tilt at the corner of his mouth. 

The bartender rolls his eyes and pours the wine without any more fuss. Gen’s smile is victorious when the other man looks away. 

Drinks in hand, Gen turns toward her. “Having fun?” 

“Definitely,” she says, sarcastically. “Nothing more fun than fending off drunk assholes at a bar.” 

Eugenides wrinkles his nose. “Well, I’m not that drunk. But point taken,” he says, with a nod, and starts to leave. 

Ah, shit. 

“No,” she says, with a quick hand on his elbow. He freezes. “I meant— Not you.” 

“Ah,” is all he says, and takes a sip of his wine. “Why’re you here, then? Aside from admiring my dance moves.” 

She gestures at the throng of people. “Got dragged out by friends. If I leave, they’ll just make me go out next weekend. If I stand here and drink my whiskey while they dance with drunk strangers, it buys me another two months.” She shrugs. 

Gen smiles. “Do you want to get some air?” he says, and gestures at the exit with his right arm. 

Irene debates. She doesn’t want to give him the wrong impression — she knows what men are like. One _yes_ and suddenly they think they’re entitled to positive answers the rest of the night. Alternatively, he seems marginally less drunk than everyone else who has approached her, and it’ll get her away from the guy who’s been leering at her across the bar for 20 minutes now. 

“Sure,” she says, and heads toward the door without waiting to see if he follows. 

*

Of course he follows. 

Outside, where the din from the club is distant, they have a real conversation. He lives up in the mountains, and hates horses, and asks for the story behind her earrings. She tells him about the vintage jewelry collection her mom left behind, and about running her dad’s company. 

“What do you do? Or are you still in school or...?”

Eugenides laughs.”I’m a computer hacker, basically. But an ethical one,” he assures her. 

“What does that even mean?” 

“Companies pay me to break into their systems and expose security threats. It’s fun,” he says, and waggles his eyebrows a little. Irene laughs despite herself. 

They chat some more, but eventually there’s a lull in the conversation that neither of them seem to know how to fill. She’s swirling the ice in her glass idly, fighting her desperation to be home with a reluctance to end the conversation. 

“Do you want another drink?” Gen says tentatively, like maybe he thought she was angling for him to buy her one. 

“No, I think I’m going to head home,” she says, because the... _everything_ is getting to her, the concentration of stimulus and emotions making her skin itch, 

“Oh, okay,” he says, and he definitely sounds disappointed. Which, again, is the problem with ever telling men _yes_. 

“I need to close out my tab though,” she says. He nods, and makes his way toward the door.

*

The dancing looks fun. It always looks fun. It’s the actual act of dancing that’s less than enjoyable. Crowded dance floors, strangers trying to touch you, people watching…

Irene wishes — though she’ll rarely even admit it to herself — that she could dance with the carefree abandon she’s seen people like Eugenides relish in her entire life. Unfortunately, she wasn’t afforded that luxury. 

Irene is eying people on the dance floor while she waits for the bartender to finish up with someone else. She sees Eugenides watching her in her periphery. She looks at him. Gone is the shy kid from two minutes ago. The sly smile is back. It’s like he can see through her; it’s unnerving. 

“Irene...do you want to dance?” 

She hesitates, but just for a second. Fuck it. 

Gen looks _delighted_. 

He leads her out to the dance floor. The song switches just as they find an empty spot, and Irene freezes. She’s not going to do a fucking square dance, and she’s certainly not going to do it with him. Gen might have a modified choreography with his relatives, but that doesn’t mean he can manage to dance one-handed with a woman who barely knows the steps. She’s _awful_ at following dances she doesn’t already know. She’s going to fuck this up and embarass them both. 

Somehow, Gen picks up on her exact freakout. He shakes his head. “Don’t worry,” he says. “I’ve got you. Just reach for me like you’re expecting my right hand, but I only use my left.” 

And he does. 

Irene is fairly certain she wouldn’t be able to explain, even in an hour, how the hell Gen does it, but she makes it through the entire dance without messing up a single time. It’s entirely thanks to him. 

It’s also...very fun. 

She’s not sure how long they’ve been dancing, but Gen is spinning her every few seconds to something carefree and upbeat, her hair slipping out of her bun, when a very large man puts an arm on Eugenides’s shoulder to get his attention. Irene recognizes him from earlier — she’s fairly certain he’s one of the cousins. 

“Gen,” says the man, with an accent so heavy she can hear it from the first word. “We have to go.” 

Gen looks at his cousin sharply. “ _Why_?”

“Boagus,” the man says with a heavy eye roll. “Got into a fight outside.” 

Gen narrows his eyes up at the man, but eventually shakes his head in resignation. 

The tall man looks from Irene to Eugenides. “I’ll meet you outside,” he says over the music, and walks off. 

Eugenides turns to her. “What luck you have,” he says, and his smile is back to shy. He hesitates for a second.

Irene wants to say something — though she has no idea what — and she’s probably being ridiculous — when Gen leans forward just enough for her to realize what he’s going to do. He pauses, and gives her time to pull away. Instead, she can feel herself swaying toward him just enough that he takes it as invitation to close the gap. 

He has his hand on her jaw, angling her face down toward his just a little. The kiss is far too soft and sweet for the middle of a sweaty dance floor, surrounded by drunken fools and loud, pounding music. 

It’s a really nice kiss. 

When he pulls away, he grins at her, a full-faced thing that makes his eyes twinkle. 

“Bye,” he says, with a quick wave, and he’s gone. 

What the _fuck_ was that? 

*

Irene kicks off her kitten heels and dumps her purse on her silver entryway table the second she’s through the door. 

This was a weird night, and she’s so relieved to be home she could cry. Her skin is still prickling from the kiss-and-dash, and all she wants to do is scrub the night off of her with a hot shower. 

She gets the water running, and doubles back for her phone while it heats up. Maybe she’ll put on some music — ABBA or Beirut or literally anything but country music. 

She flips open her crossbody bag, and sees a folded napkin she definitely didn’t put in there. Opening it, she recognizes the horse and lilies from the bar’s logo. Scribbled in terrible handwriting just below it is a name and number— 

_Gen_

_471-288-6547_

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! All my love, FOREVER, to [helvetica_upstart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/helvetica_upstart/) who is my best cheerleader and also beta'd this the DAY she finished reading Queen of Attolia. 
> 
> Come scream about QT with me on tumblr @ [storieswelove](storieswelove.tumblr.com)! Fic crossposted [here](https://storieswelove.tumblr.com/post/621461581358858240/where-did-you-come-from-where-did-you-go-the) for easy access.


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